You'll have to excuse me putting this here, but it is car-related. And this part was looking a bit threadbare.

We have a very nice neighbour. Actually, we have several very nice neighbours, but this doesn't involve any of them. This particular neigbour is a very attractive nice neighbour. Slim and blonde and other attractive things like that.

A little while ago her company car went into the repairer's for some repairs, and she was given a rather grand Mercedes as a courtesy car. She didn't like it, and I could see why. It was the kind of Mercedes that fills your mirrors and your exhaust pipe in the outside lane of the M6. Or the M4. Or the M3, M2, M40, M5, M25, M74, M8 or the M1.

So she told the company, and they took it away again. They replaced it with a Mini Countryman. One of those Mini Countrymen which bears only the faintest of resemblances to Sir Alec's original. One of those Mini Countrypeople which looks as if it had an extensive course of Botox injections then went back for some more because the first lot put lumps in all the wrong places.

Our lovely neighbour got this misshapen thing stuck across the road because she couldn't find reverse gear.

I sprinted to the rescue. Well, you would, wouldn't you?

I couldn't find reverse gear either, and the one I did find turned out to be sixth. This resulted in the Countryperson stalling ignominiously.

Or rather me stalling it ignominiously.

I'd normally dip the clutch, make sure I had neutral and reach for the ignition key. Thing was, this car had one of the most pointless inventions known to man.

A start stop button.

What's that all about?

This Mini had a special little place on the dashboard where you put the key fob and putting the key fob in the special little place allowed the car to check that the key was indeed the right key and not a different key, like the key for the bicycle padlock which failed dismally in preventing some didicoy from stealing both your bicycle and the padlock five years ago.

And once you put the key fob in this special little place, the car turns on the start stop button, meaning, helpfully, that you can start the car by pressing the button if it isn't going, or stop it if it is.

My car has a special little place for putting the key.

It's called the ignition.